In an interesting though bizarre case out of Henryville, IN, a funeral home director is facing charges of cashing in funeral insurance policies on people who were still very much alive.
Pre-burial insurance policies are purchased ahead of time by people who want to ensure their burial is taken care of in the event of their death. The funeral home then cashes in the policy when that person dies, paying for their pre-arranged burial.
Forty-two year old Richard Pyke, director at R.D. Pyke Funeral Services is accused of cashing such policies in long before the burials needed to be paid for. As a matter of fact, he was cashing them in with the named insured still living.
According to this article from WLKY, Pyke has been running this scheme since 2005 and is now facing serious felony charges of insurance fraud. Pyke was arrested last week and is now being held in the Clark County jail on $25,000 bond for 9 counts of Class C felony charges.
As the article states, the insured people didn’t lose out on the scam but the insurance companies did. One of the insured, Lynne Devers states that the company has reinstated the policy at no cost to her.
Sergeant Jerry Goodin and the Indiana State Police are asking people who have purchased similar policies from Pyke to call their insurance company and be certain theirs hasn’t been cashed in as well. In total, the cashed in policies thus far were valued at more than $65,000.
White collar crimes like insurance fraud may be viewed as less serious than violent crimes, but the fact of the matter is, when they involve large sums of money, they can be just as serious.
Each Class C felony charge carries a potential 2 to 8 year sentence in prison.
There are other very serious fraud crimes related to credit cards, checks, and even identity theft. When you are facing charges like this, you need an attorney on your side assisting you with your defense. One count of identity theft and you could be facing 3 years in prison.
If you are facing fraud or bad checks charges, call me today.